Attention Fannibals: you’re gonna have to wait a bit longer for your next course.  During the show’s TCA panel today, a tentative Hannibal Season 3 premiere date was revealed for the next slew of episodes from Bryan Fuller’s excellent drama series.  However, despite the fact that the first two seasons of the most visually arresting show on television kicked off in April and February, respectively, Season 3 won’t be airing until this summer.  When Season 2 wrapped up, Fuller made mention of the fact that he’d love to have a bit more time to prep and shoot the third season of the series instead of finishing up one season in March or April and beginning the next one in August or September; that may have been a factor in this delayed timetable.  More on Hannibal Season 3 after the jump.

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Image via NBC

While it’s a bummer that we’re gonna have to wait a while to see the continuing adventures of television’s most fashionable serial killer, it’s kind of a miracle that the show is coming back at all.  Though critically acclaimed, Hannibal has yet to become a ratings hit and is unlikely to make the change three seasons in.  Nevertheless, NBC has stuck with the show this long, and it continues to be one of the best and most striking things on all of television.

Fuller has big plans for Season 3, which is currently in production.  He previously revealed that the first couple of episodes will follow Mads Mikkelsen’s Hannibal and Gillian Anderson’s Bedelia (Anderson is a series regular now) in Europe, before turning its focus back to the hunt for the outed serial killer here in the States and, specifically, how Will (Hugh Dancy) is holding up following that bloody finale.  Mason Verger will definitely be returning, but Michael Pitt opted not to reprise his role as the now disfigured eccentric, with Joe Anderson coming onboard as his replacement.  Moreover, we recently learned that The Hobbit star Richard Armitage will be filling the role of Francis Dolarhyde aka The Tooth Fairy, confirming that we’re going to be getting into Red Dragon territory.

I seriously can’t wait for Hannibal's return and actually think it might do better in the ratings as a summer series, so my spirits are bright.  Look for our full recap of the show’s TCA panel recap here on Collider soon.

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